She's So Close That She's Gone
by AutumnPromises
Summary: He had thought when he left that day that he had lost her. It turns out that he did. Huddy


He's bowed across the expanse of ivory keys and sweet music is falling from rough, calloused hands as if there is nothing left but his soul encased in sound; his head is tipped backwards and his thigh throbs, and there's a familiar pain in his ribcage, (it could have been his heart, but he's forgotten the feeling.), but he knows that no amount of drugs will get rid of it.

She'd left, and just like that, he knew that there is no such thing as a "moment too late" … until it's come and gone. So, he sits on his wooden piano bench and plays until his fingers start to cramp and it is well into the morning. Her plane would be leaving, and then maybe he'd get up and go save a life.

He finds it all too ironic how he has the power to draw the thin line between life and death, and yet he… is already gone.

A serenade rocks the silence that cloaks his insanity and he lets it creep up his chest and strangle his throat until the only thing he can do is choke on the memory of what never was but could have been. He is used to pain, and maybe he is driven by the bittersweet essence of it, but he does not think that he can survive much longer without his heartstrings constantly being pulled with every pucker of those tropical lips and the subtle sway of those hips… he's imagined them fitting perfectly arched between his fingers.

His arms are quivering with the emotional abyss that is slowly beginning to swish around him, and in the silent suspense of the climax, he misses a single beat.

Just one, unnoticeable beat.

In the clash of night against noise, his hands slam down onto the milky keys in violent agony and a ring of finality echoes through the darkness. It seems that it is all he has left, this oblivion.

He grunts and his fingers curl around the throat of the whisky bottle that is so conveniently placed on the lid of the mahogany wood, and he rolls it between his thumb and forefinger, contemplating.

He's got a full bottle of pills and alcohol. That's all he would need. _Dieing is easy. It's the living part that's hard._ Those words cut into the withered edges of his soul and he felt as if it would be so _simple_. He's a doctor, after all, and one of the best damn doctors the world has ever known. He could make it clean- there wouldn't be a mess left for Wilson to pick up.

He purposefully throws his head back and the bourbon slips down his throat in a sweet glide, and he feels the stale taste in his mouth slide away with it, but he knows that he won't get drunk. Not tonight… because maybe he feels that it was part of his fault that she's gone, and maybe… he feels as if he has to punish himself for it.

He's never had such a spiritual depth to the way he acts as now, and he almost smirks- a small upturn of the left side of his unshaven mouth. Only _she_ could make him feel as if he's in a paradox of his own mind, and he's far too lost without her.

There is a rapping of dry knuckles against the wood of his door and he hesitates for a moment, and then defiantly taps a gentle, nonchalant scale. He isn't going to get up and answer it- the alpha in his mind roars rebelliously and hisses that his pride is too great to be seen in such a wreck, (even _he_ can admit to himself how pathetic he is. He can feel it.), but then the softer side, her side, the _lover's_ side, coos a soft whisper into his teeth. It isn't strong enough to persuade him, it never was, but it helps sometimes. It helps him not to run.

"House?" Her voice is a caress of an epiphany that he never thought he would have, and for a split moment, he is perplexed in the cushioned cocoon of her presence, but then reality looms grotesquely over his shoulder, and he pretends that she isn't there. Pretending is so much easier.

He melts and begins to play again, and his fingers bounce lightly over the meaningless tunes, and he smugly notes that everybody lies- even music.

He hears the metallic click of a lock and then the quiet squeal of the old hinges being rolled against one another, and then he can _feel_ her standing in the doorway, her hair a flurry of flawless ebony curls and crystal snow. She's staring runny noses and sticky mascara into his spine and he is so in sync with her that he just knows by instinct that she is crying.

"Hi." Her feminine voice is a raspy murmur. His back seems to hunch just slightly lower and his fingers become heavier, hovering over the keys, but still he does not acknowledge her silhouette stretching across the walls of the candlelight room.

"You never said goodbye today." She's mimicking a weak smile and trying to act as if it's just a casual comment, a cheeky comment, but they can both see right through her mask and the faux playing of them both isn't at all convincing.

"Neither did you." He deflects and speaks to her for the first time that day, and his voice is harsher than he would have expected. She falls silent and then there's nothing except the thick tension that circulates the room, and it's so electrifying that he can almost see a light smoke wisping through the air.

They are both perfectly still, and then a muscled arm reaches out to grab his cane that is leaning against one of the piano's legs, and he pulls himself up with it before swiveling on his heel to face her. His entire weight is heavily resting on this cane, and if it weren't there, he does not know if he could have been able to stand at all. The two pains were too great; swirling around his being in one intricate web of hurt.

His brows are pulled together and he stares off into nothing and anything but her eyes, and they are both holding their breath.

Finally, she shifts herself from one foot to the other, and that is all he needs to shoot up the defenses.

He exhales dramatically and then looks straight at her, and by the way she flinches, he can tell that she can feel the steel from the wall that surrounds him. "So, here for a last minute booty call? … I think I have time before Wilson gets here." It's quiet and lame and the only thing he could think of, but he hopes it is enough to drive her away.

Her beautiful little face slowly cocks to the side and her bottom lip is plump and parted and shivering in the intensity of the moment. "Everybody lies." His eyes widen just slightly and they are looking straight into each other, because that unexpected comment shut down his walls, and then they both breath and she reaches out to him.

He is feeling as if the world is collapsing around them when he wraps her in his arms and he presses her against him, because he's gotta protect her from everything that's happening. Her fingernails dig into the skin of his biceps and they are engulfed by each other, the smell, the taste, the _idea_. Her stunningly vibrant lips are pressed against his and he is pressing back with a needy hunger that runs so much deeper than just lust, and then her mouth slowly parts and their tongues dance together.

His hands smooth along the wrinkles in her jacket before he hooks his fingers through her collar and pulls down, and the material drops to his floor with a quiet thump that is muted by the wet groans and breathless gasps. Her hands clutch the back of his neck and curl themselves into his dark mess of hair and slowly, they awkwardly walk backwards, too drowned in each other to notice when they roughly bump his piano seat.

He is taking control and she lets him with a submissive purr into his ear, and he deftly fingers the first button of her blouse before strong, masculine fists grip the hem and rip the two halves apart. Buttons scatter and roll across the room but he is already pushing the silky fabric down her arms and is too lost in ecstasy to notice anything but her, his own personal little savior, because if she hadn't come…

His hands unzip her skirt and it falls limply to the ground, and then he jabs his fingers into the waistband of her panties. "Red." He almost smiles before pulling them down, and he is almost struck silent by the perfection.

"Greg…" An airless moan rattled into his ear as he cups her firm breasts through the lacy material of her bra, and they are so perfect, she is so _fucking_ perfect, that he growls and a rough palm thrusts her right thigh up and coaxes it to wrap possessively around his.

Her head tips backwards and the creamy column of her throat is exposed to him, and he kisses the dip in either side. He can tell that she's falling apart in his hands and he is holding her up with one hand splayed across the small of her back, and she's dipping so low that her satin locks are resting against the keys of the piano.

There is a single candle flaring a blaze from a side table and the warmth pirouettes across her skin in delicious little patterns. He is too anxious to see her, all of her, so he easily unsnaps the clip of her bra and pulls it off with one expert gesture, and she's clutching onto him for dear life, much like he is clutching to her. The sight of her before him, panting and naked and praying his name in sweet chants, sends a fresh flush of blood and heat straight to his groin and he's throbbing persistently against the inside of her hip.

She chokes on intimacy and he slowly leans forward to swirl his tongue tauntingly around the pearled bud of her nipple before nibbling in a gentle, almost worshipful way, and she calls out into the serene of his apartment that had only minutes ago been clouded with angst and confusion.

There was absolutely nothing _wrong_ about this.

He kisses his way across her chest and then holds the rounded breast in his hand, her nipple peeking out from between his fingers. He groans against the restraint of his pants and then she's there, unzipping and pulling down and releasing him, erect and ready. She works simultaneously with one hand slowly stroking him, making him beat mercilessly against her hand, and unbuttoning his shirt with the other.

"You're wearing too many clothes." She hums seductively, and he smirks against her cheek as she impatiently pulls the thin thread cloth to the ground in a pile with the others at the foot of his piano.

With both hands, he gently, protectively, lowers her to the surface of the white keys and as she presses against them, the most intricate harmony of noise rings sharply through the dark and they both gasp. He sits, then, in the same poise he had been in when she'd come first, and parts her legs with a determined sweep.

She's wet and dripping onto his instrument, and he swears that no fantasy could compare to this utter gorgeous view before him. She's got a death grip in his hair and she's leaning over his head, curling into him, and he slowly licks up the inside of her thigh before kissing the little tuft of hair that leads to an oasis of her.

"Perfect…" He breathes, and it's so silent that he's sure she couldn't here him. He kisses her there then before slipping his tongue into her abyss and she instantly arches against him, her guttural moan echoing off of the walls. It's sexy and so female all at the same time, and he wonders how he could have ever lived so close, but so far away.

"Greg… please…" She is weakly trying to lift him up to her and he understands, (because understanding is their one constant), and he rises, and the pain in his leg is there but not harsh, not with her breathing into his air and he into hers, so he thinks that it's worth it.

Her delicate hands grip his shoulders and she scootches forwards on the keyboard, settling him between her thighs, before he thrusts forward and they both muffle their screams into each other's necks.

"Oh _god_." He groans, and she smiles a little chesire grin against his skin. She's so tight and her walls are squeezing him and they both wait a moment, exhilarated and ready, and it isn't at all hard or rocky to feel like this with each other, and he can tell that they are both thinking the same thing: _how?_

She rolls her hips against his and then they start a sweaty dance with him thrusting into her and her kissing his chest and neck with appreciative, adoring kisses. He finds it corny to think that they fit like two pieces of a puzzle, but he loves puzzles, and he thinks that maybe he has finally gotten the answer to the labyrinth that _is_ Lisa Cuddy and Gregory House.

He is looking down at her with some mixed expression that's bothering him to wear because he doesn't know exactly what it is, but she doesn't notice because she is fluttering her fingers over his deformed scar- she knows how to rub it to soothe some of his pain and for the first time since the infarction, he feels as if he wants her to handle his leg, (she does it so well. She is so good to him.)

Knowing fingers begin to tap against her clit in the same pattern that he might use to play music and he can't find a better way to explain the beauty of how he is playing his very own perfect woman, (and being the observant man he is, he realizes the flaw- she is not and never will be his.)

His thoughts are banished as she starts to grind against his hips between thrusts and he can tell by the way her face is scrunching up into the most adorable expression that she is holding back, she's _waiting_ for him. He's completely firm and ready, and so he kisses her hard on the mouth and then whispers between little, passionate pecks, "Just… let me love you."

Her mouth drops and her eyes slide closed and she screams into his neck, and he can feel little tears falling from her chiseled jaw onto his stubble, and then he explodes into the ultimate conclusion, and he can hear her panting behind a veil of dark; a reality where nothing is negative because she's there so close, and he's happy.

But then the shakes don't stop; the tears don't sink back into her eyes. They ripple over the edge of her dripped eyeliner eyes and then slide like glass diamonds down her porcelain skin, and he realizes that there isn't anything he can do… because she's leaving.

She's got a plane to catch.

He grunts and steps away, and suddenly he feels so alone and secluded from the warmth she so willingly gave. She coughs nervously into her hand and she steps wobbly from her pedestal on his piano to the ground and wavers for a moment before straightening into that superior posture that she had used to strut around the hospital with.

He leans on his cane that he had dropped in their passion, and he just… watches her. She does not meet his gaze and instead she shuffles through his apartment, pulling on her clothes in a disarray compared to the flawless business demeanor she had arrived with.

There is a sinking feeling in his ribcage, (it could have been his heart, but she's got it hostage in her gentle clutches), and he can slowly feel himself sinking into the water, drowning without her.

She's standing in his doorway and she's got one foot stepped out into the hallway and her back turned to him. "Goodbye House." Her voice is broken and raspy, and then the door shuts.

… And he feels his heart being ripped across the earth in her wake.

_end._

**just wanted to say thanks for all the reviews on my last story. it really means a lot.**

**not sure if i categorized this right. sorry if it's wrong.**


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